LinuxQuestions.org - PCI-to-SATA or IDE-to-SATA

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PCI-to-SATA or IDE-to-SATA

Do the PCI-to-SATA or IDE-to-SATA converters help improve disk performance? Which is better? Are either faster than an IDE drive?

I know --- lots of variables involved. :) Just looking for a general idea.

Thanks much. :)

Basically, you are limited to the disk speed. The rule-of-thumb for disk performance is to just look at RPMs. 5400 RPM drives will be slow, 15K RPM drives will be fast, SSD will be very fast. But to a first-order approximation, a 5400 RPM IDE drive will perform about the same as a 5400 RPM SATA drive.

Quote:

Originally Posted by smallpond (Post 5165159)

But to a first-order approximation, a 5400 RPM IDE drive will perform about the same as a 5400 RPM SATA drive.

That is only true for disks with the same amount of available space and platters. A 1 platter 1TB disk will be faster than a 2 platter 1TB disk at the same RPMs.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Woodsman (Post 5165157)

Are you talking of using IDE to SATA plugin in converter to an existing IDE drive and allow it to be used on a newer SATA based motherboard?

My experience with recycling older IDE drives using IDE to SATA plugin in converters to a SATA based motherboard has been mixed. Some converters were flakey in allowing consistent bootups in Linux. And it seem to depend on getting BIOS settings 'just right'.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TobiSGD (Post 5165173)

That is only true for disks with the same amount of available space and platters. A 1 platter 1TB disk will be faster than a 2 platter 1TB disk at the same RPMs.

Eh? The 2-platter drive has to seek half as often (for sequential I/O) as the 1-platter drive, so I think you mean the other way around.

Quote:

Are you talking of using IDE to SATA plugin in converter to an existing IDE drive and allow it to be used on a newer SATA based motherboard?

I am interested in installing SATA drives in older motherboards that only support IDE. I want to know whether the PCI-to-SATA or IDE-to-SATA converters are worth the time, money, and effort.

If the older motherboard supports one or two SATA ports then there are no problems. A newer SATA drive is limited to SATA I speeds but no converters are needed.

Of course, there also is the option of buying an IDE drive, but they are getting fewer and fewer with retailers. :)

Just trying to get a feel for how these converters work. Not interested in comparing SATA to PATA speeds. :) This is for a limited number of people with limited budgets and options.

Quote:

Originally Posted by smallpond (Post 5165218)

Eh? The 2-platter drive has to seek half as often (for sequential I/O) as the 1-platter drive, so I think you mean the other way around.

Seek times may be lower on 2 platter drives, but data density is higher on one platter drive, assuming the same capacity. This means that more data can be read in one second on a 1 platter drive compared to a two platter drive, or the same amount of data in less time.
You can see that for example here, where a 1 platter version is tested against a two platter version of the same drive: http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=...95&postcount=4

I am just interested in whether the converters are worth the time, effort, and money. :D

I have one of those pci-sata cards, since my mobo doesn't have sata slots (yes, very old :D ten(or more) years old)
I think it is very cheap.

Code:

01:09.0 RAID bus controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6421 IDE/SATA Controller (rev 50)

        Subsystem: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6421 IDE/SATA Controller

        Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx-

        Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx-

        Latency: 32

        Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 17

        Region 0: I/O ports at 9800 [size=16]

        Region 1: I/O ports at 9c00 [size=16]

        Region 2: I/O ports at a000 [size=16]

        Region 3: I/O ports at a400 [size=16]

        Region 4: I/O ports at a800 [size=32]

        Region 5: I/O ports at ac00 [size=256]

        [virtual] Expansion ROM at 40000000 [disabled] [size=64K]

        Capabilities: [e0] Power Management version 2

                Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-)

                Status: D0 NoSoftRst- PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

        Kernel driver in use: sata_via

Slackware recognized it right out of the box, since 13.37.
Has two sata (150MB I think), one IDE and one e-sata.
Unfortunately I cannot boot from any device plugged, sata or ide.

I have two sata devices on that card, hard disk and dvd drive.
I think there is an issue with the linux driver and the dvd,
because when I try to make an iso from any dvd, or mp3 from audio cd,
the machine freezes (keyboard,mouse), and on winXP this doesn't happen.
But with hard disk I have no problems.

About performance, is worst than native IDE but I think this is due to
pci bus width, sata driver (maybe generic and not optimized), and maybe
transfer between different system files (ext4 and ntfs).

With winXP, transfer rate IDE <-> sata/pci is +- 40MB/s
With Slackware, is +- 15MB/s

I think this is most because XP uses optimized drivers from NVidia.
I tried some configs with hdparm, but didn't get any better than that.

PCI to SATA cards I've found generally ok. The plugin IDE to SATA adapters I've had about a 50% success rate.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TobiSGD (Post 5165258)

I note in the test that access time on the 1-platter drive is 16 msec, on the 2-platter 13 msec. This is due to the higher cost for seeks than head switches. It is true that two platters with lower density will be slower than 1 platter at higher density, but for two disks manufactured in the same process, the 2-platter disk will win on speed. In the early days, one of the disk manufacturers added a second set of heads on the same surfaces to cut rotational latency in half. I think that was on the 14" drives.

I've had good luck with the 4 port Sil-3114 and Sil-3124 based PCI-SATA cards. Good read/write speeds and compatibility. I always reflash to the non-raid firmware, sourced from SIIG.

I would not be interested in RAID support. Only in being able to install a SATA drive on a system with no SATA ports. I am not expecting miracles. People with such motherboards already have "slow" systems, although they are unlikely to know or notice. They are unlikely to notice any impact of running through a converter.

I have a couple of clunkers here. I might buy one card to experiment. But the easiest solution for such people probably is to just buy an IDE drive. :)

I would guess that throughput would be higher with a PCI-SATA than with IDE-SATA -since the latter is really PCI->IDE->SATA, if seen from the perspective of the mobo bus.

My twapence is that it isn't worth the time and effort. This is not a conclusion I came to easily. I'm old school - brought up with "waste not, want not" and also an inveterate tweaker. It took years of squeezing the last drop of usefulness out of old systems and adding up what it ended up costing me and noticing article after article of "How To Build a Gaming PC for $300" before I finally "got it". The economic and digital world isn't like the old one. Between the rapid advancement common in a fledgling industry that is also extremely popular and profitable and planned obsolescence, I think it is just wiser to save your money and get newer, at the very least up to all the changes of busses from parallel to serial, and there, especially, SATA, since it will be quite a long time before drives are able to swamp the SATA bus..